New Perfume Review By Kilian Love: Don’t Be Shy Extreme- Finding a New Beat

Posted on by in Mark Behnke, New Perfume Reviews and tagged , , , .

It is often a mystery why a brand chooses to start producing flankers. For the mass-market ones that I understand. That’s commercialism. I am more intrigued when an independent brand chooses to do it. I’ve hypothesized it is an opportunity to re-interpret a divisive ingredient or accord from the original. Like taking a second swing at the piñata. The creative director of By Kilian, Kilian Hennessy has seemingly been trying to find new ways to display the unique central accord in one of his first releases, By Kilian Love: Don’t Be Shy Extreme is the third try.

Kilian Hennessy

Love: Don’t Be Shy was part of the original set of releases in 2007. From a purely conceptual perspective it was also probably the most realized. Working with perfumer Calice Becker they created one of the first gourmands to push into new territory. Their focal point was to create a marshmallow accord as the keynote. This wasn’t just the sugary sweet puff. It was also the rose water laced syrup to go with it. That accord was a love it/hate it kind of experience. I was in the former category. Those in the latter found it too sweet and reminiscent of bubble gum in an unpleasant way. It was always a fun experiment to be with sniff groups at the Boston Saks and watch to see a first impression to it.

Calice Becker

In the last couple of years there were two attempts at flankers. All done by Mme Becker. One was Love: Don’t Be Shy Eau Fraiche which chose to make the entire thing more transparent. That left me wanting more. A more successful rendition was Love: Don’t Be Shy Rose and Oud. I still experience it as a mash-up of the original Love and another Kilian, Rose Oud. What I want to comment on is the rose in that gave the marshmallow accord a more sophisticated style. Love: Don’t Be Shy Extreme seems to be driving down the middle between both previous flankers.

Extreme begins with the marshmallow water accord and neroli together. This is part of the way the original began, too. A rich jammy Bulgarian rose comes next. Just as I experienced in the Rose and Oud flanker the rose transforms the marshmallow accord. That accord has a rose water component. When this opulent rose shows up it supercharges that part of the confectionary accord. Instead of feeling childish it feels like the choice of an iconoclast. The marshmallow gets sweeter as time goes by, but the rose stands right next to it all the way to the end.

Love: Don’t Be Shy Extreme has 10-12 hour longevity and average sillage.

It will always be hard for any flanker to seem better to me than the original. I think it is one of the great perfumes in the entire collection. What I like about Extreme is it chooses to ask the marshmallow accord to find a little more maturity. Not enough that the echoes of the childish giggle aren’t still noticeable. Just enough to allow you to wear it and walk to your own beat.

Disclosure: This review was based on a sample supplied by By Kilian.

–Mark Behnke

New Perfume Review Six Scents Nappa Noir- 2012 Redux

Posted on by in Mark Behnke, New Perfume Reviews and tagged , , , , .
1

In the five years from 2007-2012 there was a vitality to the ideas and concepts being applied to fragrance. Every time I would turn around there was something new hoping to gain traction. These were also the years when every designer seemingly wanted into the perfume game. This was a particularly grim time for those designers who looked for mainstream success. The real creativity was coming from those who chose to create a fragrance to go with their fashion in the niche space.

Joseph Quartana

The designers which made it work created lines which have survived until today. One of the most interesting concepts within this time-period came from Joseph Quartana. He created a collection called Six Scents. He would match young up and coming fashion designers with a perfumer. Six designers and six perfumers would make up a series. It remains one of my favorite fashion and perfume partnerships because there seemed to be a real attempt to marry the fashion and fragrance aesthetics.

Raphael Young

I liked it so much I bugged Mr. Quartana anytime I ran into him. He knew what was coming as soon as he saw the Hawaiian shirt and fedora moving towards him. He was always kind enough to send me a sample set. In 2012, Series No.4 was coming out. I would review all six of them while I was writing at CaFleureBon. Little did I know that one of them never made it to the shelf. Now almost nine years later it has become available. I thought it would be interesting to revisit Six Scents Nappa Noir again.

The team put together by Mr. Quartana for Nappa Noir was shoe designer Raphael Young and perfumer Calice Becker. Mr. Young was known for creating footwear as sculpture. He had a discerning customer who wanted to wear an artistic statement. Mme Becker had experienced a rapid rise to one of the most sought-after perfumers. In 2012 when she worked on Nappa Noir she had also become the singular muse for By Kilian creating some of the most memorable perfumes for that collection. When these two artists were brought together, they created a perfume as precisely balanced as one of Mr. Young’s shoes.

Calice Becker

They decided to make a floriental with gourmand nuances. Those come right at the start. It is as if having a cigarette at a café with a coffee and cookie was needed. Mme Becker swirls the tobacco of a lit cigarette over a bitterly strong coffee. Underneath is a subtle pastry accord based on speculoos cookies. This means a lightly sweet gingerbread inserts itself between the smoke and coffee. We then enter the workshop and take out a fresh piece of leather to shape. This is freshly processed still containing the bite of birch tar. Mme Becker uses violet, orris, and ylang-ylang to refine the obstreperous beast into something more elegant. Violet is the main floral to interact with the leather. Patchouli, vanilla, and musk continue to shape the leather into something as delightful to smell as the shoes are to look at.

Nappa Noir has 12-14 hour longevity and average sillage.

In the years since I first tried Nappa Noir violet and leather have become a favorite. It wasn’t as prevalent in 2012 as it would become. I like Nappa Noir better now than I did then and I liked it a lot. As I went back over all the Six Scents releases, I am surprised at how durable they have been. They don’t seem dated. That seems to show what a good matchmaker Mr. Quartana was. You might think a floriental leather perfume form 2012 wouldn’t fit in 2021. Allow Nappa Noir to change your thinking.

Disclosure: this review based on a sample provided by Six Scents.

–Mark Behnke

New Perfume Review By Kilian Love: Don’t Be Shy Rose & Oud- Kilian Mash-Up

Posted on by in Mark Behnke, New Perfume Reviews and tagged , , , .

I am a fan of the musical form known as the mash-up. It is where they take two disparate songs and combine them into something entirely new. It turns pop songs I think banal into something I play over and over. When it comes to perfume those who layer their fragrances are essentially doing the same thing. I don’t think a brand has consciously done it until I received my sample of By Kilian Love: Don’t Be Shy Rose & Oud.

Kilian Hennessy

When Kilian Hennessy made his entrance on the fragrance shelves in 2007 he was selling a unique luxurious version of perfume. Especially his first set of releases which were all memorable. One of those was Love: Don’t Be Shy which was a wonderful floral gourmand based around a fantastic accord of marshmallow water. I think of it as one of the forerunners of this style becoming the current trend. Three years later M. Hennessy would branch out with the first of his oud focused fragrances, Rose Oud. This is still one of my very favorite uses of oud in perfume. Both perfumes were composed by perfumer Calice Becker.

Calice Becker

Working with Mme Becker, M. Hennessy seemingly wanted the marshmallow water accord of the original Love and the titular notes of Rose Oud to come together in a perfume mash-up. It does give me new thoughts on these accords.

This perfume opens with the fabulous marshmallow accord Mme Becker thrilled me with twelve years ago. It has a sugary floral quality underpinned by a watery orange blossom. All that returns. In the original Love that became sweeter over time. In this case Mme Becker slowly brings the rose and oud into play. She has a careful balancing act here because the marshmallow accord is way opaquer than either rose or oud.  In the early moments of detecting the rose and oud is where this fragrance is at its most intriguing. Over time the rose and oud do take over but there is a decent amount of time where the three components are beautifully singing in harmony.

Love: Don’t be Shy Rose & Oud has 12-14 hour longevity and average sillage.

One thing I thought, and proved to myself, you can’t get the same effect by layering the two scents which are brought together here. This is a purer attempt to find the places where these three things can co-exist. Especially in the middle as the marshmallow accord holds its own with the rose and oud, I find this to be a decadent floral gourmand. I would’ve like that to hold on for longer. But just as in musical mash-ups they have to give both songs the time to shine. Love: Don’t Be Shy Rose & Oud does this very well.

Disclosure: This review is based on a sample provided by Kilian.

–Mark Behnke

Calice Becker 201

Posted on by in Mark Behnke, Perfumer 201 and tagged , , , , , , .

They say the test of time is one of the measures of great creativity. They also say that vision is instinctual. The memorable artists have it from the moment they take their first steps in their chosen form. Perfumery has more than a few for whom these statements are true for. One of them is Calice Becker.

Ever since perfumers have become more known Mme Becker has been the quiet rockstar perfumer. She continues to advocate for the future since she was named the head of the Givaudan Perfumery School in 2017. Her twenty-plus years as a perfume has seen her create pillar perfumes for some of the largest mainstream brands while finding a willing partner in creative director Kilian Hennessy to allow her to explore the niche perfume side of things. That partnership has produced some of the greatest niche perfumes, ever, since they started working together in 2007. She is a consummate professional who has produced some of the best that perfume has to offer. For this month’s Perfumer 201 I’m going to focus on the pillars of her career, as I see them.

The first commercial brief for Mme Becker was Tommy Hilfiger Tommy Girl. Tommy Hilfiger wanted a perfume to capture his All-American fashion aesthetic. It always makes me smile that he turned to a perfumer of French and Russian heritage. The perfume shows what will become one of Mme Becker’s signatures; exquisitely balanced accords. The top accord here is of a vast green lawn of freshly cut grass. Spearmint is used to provide an expansive quality to the heart of the grassy accord. A fresh floral accord of honeysuckle gives way to a clean cedar and sandalwood foundation. When you smell this today it needs to be said this was one of the first perfumes of its kind when released in 1996. By a perfumer who was unafraid to follow her instincts to produce something different for the brief she was given.

If anyone was inclined to think that was a fluke, she would follow up three short years later with another blockbuster of a fragrance; Dior J’Adore. This time the green in the top is a sinuous ivy. It leads into a brilliant floral accord in the heart of champaca, jasmine, and rose. To this she adds an “orchid accord”. So often in one of Mme Becker’s compositions there is a linchpin which snaps things together. In J’Adore the orchid is that. It provides the stitching together of the floral leads while also providing subtle dewiness which makes it memorable. She then grounds it with a set of fruits, Damson plum to add a juicy tartness with an accord of blackberry and an animalic musk. This is what every fruity floral since J’Adore has failed to achieve.

Mme Becker would burnish her reputation for trendsetting mainstream perfume with 2003’s Estee Lauder Beyond Paradise and 2009’s Marc Jacobs Lola on which she worked with Yann Vasnier. Like many of the mainstream perfumers of the time as we crossed into the 2000’s they wanted to jump aboard the niche perfumery trend. Mme Becker found the right place for her to make that leap.

By Kilian Back to Black would be the sixth perfume Mme Becker would make for creative director Kilian Hennessy’s luxury niche brand. To this point M. Hennessy had only worked with two perfumers for his brand. Mme Becker has mentioned in multiple interviews how difficult it is to get a realistic version of a natural effect using just the essential oil. The building of accords is what can provide the nuance which captures what is missing. Nowhere is this more evident than in the tobacco accord she assembles in Back to Black; without a drop of tobacco essential oil. It is one of my favorite party tricks to spray some Back to Black on a strip and ask people to smell it hours later. It is only then that the components have begun to unravel enough to understand that the lush slightly mentholated tobacco you smelled earlier was an olfactory illusion. I have always considered this to be the best perfume in the entire By Kilian line.

Mme Becker’s work for By Kilian has shown her creativity is boundless. In 2014’s By Kilian Intoxicated she produced a coffee gourmand that was compelling. Her inspiration was spice laced Turkish coffee. To her rich coffee accord which captures the oily bitterness along with the roasted nature of coffee she mixes in a sticky green cardamom. Nutmeg and cinnamon arrive soon after but Intoxicated is the dark coffee accord and green cardamom. You won’t find it at your local coffee shop, but it is one of my favorite coffee perfumes.  

Technology moves forward and Mme Becker moves with it. Givaudan came up with a new technology called Freeze Frame. This is where they take a source, like lime, freeze it in liquid nitrogen, then as it thaws do a headspace isolation. What this produce is an HD version of lime to place at the center of Ralph Lauren Collection Lime. Because the new technology has supplied her with what she usually created through accords she only uses two additional ingredients; bergamot and lavandin with the Freeze Frame lime. It is a simply marvelous near-photorealistic lime as perfume.

Disclosure: This review is based on bottles of all the fragrances mentioned I purchased.

–Mark Behnke

New Perfume Review Parfums de Marly Cassili- A Fruity Floral of a Different Stripe

Posted on by in Mark Behnke, New Perfume Reviews and tagged , , , , .

It is interesting to watch a brand evolve over time. Parfums de Marly seems to be a recent example that wants to provide luxurious niche alternatives to mainstream styles. Over the past couple of years this has seemingly become a winning formula for the brand. I like it because it has become a place where I can point someone looking for a niche alternative to their favorite commercial fragrance. If there is a style where I wasn’t sure I would be as interested it would be fruity floral. With Parfums de Marly Cassili it turns out I am interested.

Julien Sprecher

The Creative Director Julien Sprecher has chosen to collaborate with perfumers Calice Becker and Nanako Ogi for Cassili. Both women design a top fruity floral accord layered under a heart fruity floral accord. All of this was directed by M. Sprecher to be an “indulgent” “sweet perfume”. His perfume team delivers.

Calice Becker

The top accord is a typical combination for the genre; berries and rose. The perfumers delve a little deeper to create a more satisfying effect. One of my main complaints about fruity florals is the perfumes just assault you with sweet notes. Cassili comes at it in a slightly different way. The berries and rose are intense but the perfumers also found a way to make them more harmonious instead of being two ingredients screaming at the top of their lungs. There is a velvet sophistication to this opening which is not often found. The heart accord is a pairing of plum and mimosa. This is not so common a duo. The perfumers use a restrained greener version of plum which dials back the sweetness. It also makes it a less lush underpinning as the mimosa takes over with its green facets picking up on the same in the plum. Once both were in place the overlap of the two accords was delightful. The base is a typical sweetly woody accord of sandalwood, benzoin and vanilla.

Cassili has 12-14 hour longevity and average sillage.

I applaud the work done here to make a more opulent fruity floral. I think it shows how a more imaginative creative direction can turn the tritest forms into something worth trying. M. Sprecher pointed the way for his perfumers to turn Cassili into a fruity floral of a different stripe.

Disclosure: This review was based on a sample provided by Parfums de Marly.

–Mark Behnke

New Perfume Review Tommy Hilfiger Tommy Girl Now- For the Original Girl’s Daughters

Posted on by in Mark Behnke, New Perfume Reviews and tagged , , .

I think it is evident how much I enjoy writing about the creative side of the perfume business. Whenever there is a new creative director, perfumer, or brand which actually carries out a stated vision the words come effortlessly. I wasn’t writing about perfume in 1996 but I can look back in hindsight. When I do that, I know Tommy Hilfiger Tommy Girl would have been one of those effortless moments. I’ve certainly written about it many times since I started blogging. Tommy Girl was the first brief for one of our greatest perfumers, Calice Becker. One reason I return to it often is there are many of the foundational techniques I have seen in her perfume in the years since. Because of that I was very interested when I heard about Tommy Hilfiger Tommy Girl Now which was also composed by Mme Becker. What would she see as being “now” as opposed to “then”?

Calice Becker

What I got was something intriguing. When Tommy Girl came out it was meant to be an All-American companion to the fashion of Tommy Hilfiger. It is amusing because the perfumer is from French and Russian roots which showed up in Tommy Girl. What transformed it into something American was an overall freshness. As an exemplar of that it succeeded as one of the best mainstream perfumes of all-time.

What do you change to make that contemporary? Do you throw everything out and start over? Or do you look for something small but significant to change? The answer from Mme Becker is to retain the top two-thirds and place that on a base which is popular currently. That is Tommy Girl Now.

The top accord is almost the same except Mme Becker pushes it a bit greener with the sharpness of shiso and by upping the blackcurrant bud concentration. It is still the same tea room accord but it has a different paint job. It leads to a near-identical floral heart which is a now-classic construct of magnolia, honeysuckle, jasmine, rose, and violet. It remains a fantastically vibrant accord. This all leads to the biggest change in Tommy Girl Now; the base. The original was a woody mixture of cedar and sandalwood. This new version embraces the trend of gourmand florals with vanilla and musks rising to meet that exquisite floral accord. This is done in a less transparent way as many of the current floral gourmands but much lighter than the original.

Tommy Girl Now has 10-12 hour longevity and average sillage.

I think the choice to change the base might be the correct one because it is what differentiates the Now from the then. If it is true, then I suspect Tommy Girl Now will become popular among the daughters of those who wore Tommy Girl. I hope so because the top part of either version of Tommy Girl should continue as long as it can.

Disclosure: this review is based on a sample provided by Tommy Hilfiger.

–Mark Behnke

New Perfume Review By Kilian Love the Way You Feel- Polynesian Dreams

Posted on by in Mark Behnke, New Perfume Reviews and tagged , , , .
1

Sometimes delays work to a new perfume’s advantage. I have commented that it is difficult to judge a perfume which is meant for the opposite season from which I receive it. There are times when I try it in its proper season which causes me to see it as it should be. Unfortunately, the calendar and PR firms do not subscribe to my desire. As the first rush of this fall’s new releases have begun to arrive in the middle of a 100-plus degree heat wave. Then there are those who just take more time to arrive. Because of ongoing postal delivery issues my samples of the new By Kilian Miami Vice Collection were significantly delayed. I think it was better that I got them just as summer was heating up.

Kilian Hennessy

The Miami Vice Collection is a two-fragrance release; Love the Way You Feel and Love the Way You Taste. Creative Director Kilian Hennessy chose to work with two of the perfumers who have been there from the beginning. Sidonie Lancesseur composed Love the Way You Taste. It is a Kilian take on a mojito fragrance. The evocation of boozy accords has been a staple of By Kilian. Love the Way You Taste captures it, but it felt like a higher quality version of other mojito perfumes I’ve tried.

Calice Becker

For Love the Way You Feel M. Kilian and perfumer Calice Becker returned to something they’ve done so well in the past creating a near-perfect accord of something which exists. In this case it was to be a re-creation of Monoi Oil as perfume. Monoi Oil is the skin softener and hair spray of choice in Polynesia. It is made by soaking tiare flowers in coconut oil. Those will be the tentpoles that Mme Becker will build upon. She effectively chooses some complementary notes to complete the effect.

The perfume opens on the sun-glistened accord of bergamot and neroli. The neroli allows for the tiare to echo the floral quality as it appears. Tiare in this form has a kind of sparkly quality, too. To begin to give it the depth of Monoi Oil Mme Becker uses the oily nature of ylang ylang to provide a slippery floral nature. This becomes more prevalent as coconut starts to complete the accord. The final ingredient is vanilla, as modulator, providing the right amount of sweetness to the overall effect.

Love the Way You Feel has 10-12 hour longevity and average sillage.

When Mme Becker does these kind of perfumes I almost hear an audible click as it all assembles into a single beautifully realistic accord. Once the vanilla arrives it is like I am in the middle of a Polynesian dream. Which is exactly where I want to be in the middle of summer.

Disclosure: this review is based on samples provided by By Kilian.

–Mark Behnke

New Perfume Review By Kilian Woman in Gold- Glittering Klimt

Posted on by in Mark Behnke, New Perfume Reviews and tagged , , , , .

Of the many things I learned working with Michelyn Camen, the EIC of CaFleureBon, was an appreciation of how visual art intersected with olfactory art. Her addition of just the perfect choices of visual cues to match the words of the writers who worked for her has made that one of the signatures of CaFleureBon. One of the things I enjoyed most was when she would give me some deep cuts in artists I thought I knew well. One of those was Gustav Klimt. I knew of the famous “The Kiss” but there were others from his “Golden Phase” which I would learn of. One was a portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer which has been called the Austrian Mona Lisa. They are paintings which feel like naturals to be paired with fragrance. Kilian Hennessy also must believe that too as they become the latest inspiration for the newest collection from By Kilian; From Dusk to Dawn. The one called Woman in Gold is the one attached to the painting  of Adele Bloch-Bauer below.

Adele Bloch-Bauer I by Gustav Klimt (1907)

M. Hennessy collaborates again with his most frequent perfumed muse Calice Becker. They were looking for “the contrasts between shadow and light”. I would also remark they were looking for the golden glow of Hr. Klimt’s paintings, too.

Kilian Hennessy

Mme Becker opens with a rich bergamot oil to give off a golden sunburst. This is not the typical opening as the bergamot has a shimmery quality which reveals a multi-faceted rose underneath. This is where the shadows reside in Woman in Gold. Geranium pairs with the rose to provide a translucent green lens to observe it through. The whole construct turns warm with vanilla as it infuses the floral heart. Then Mme Becker takes the patchouli bio-isolate Akigalawood to provide a slightly spicy version of patchouli which bridges the rose while contrasting the vanilla. It settles in to a powerful accord of all three in perfect harmony.

Woman in Gold has 12-14 hour longevity and above average siilage. This is one to be cautious in spraying, a little goes a long way.

Calice Becker

This is a cold weather rosy vanilla it reminds me a lot of another rose creation in the brand Rose Oud. In both cases the keynotes are given the room to shine. In the case of Woman in Gold I guess I should say it glitters.

Disclosure: this review is based on a sample provided by By Kilian.

–Mark Behnke

New Perfume Review By Kilian Noir Aphrodisiaque- Hot Chocolate by Calice

Posted on by in Mark Behnke, New Perfume Reviews and tagged , , .

I must start as I always do with city exclusive releases that I hate them as a concept, especially when they are good. The By Kilian brand has been doing some pretty good ones for their different boutiques as they open around the world. I spend some time chasing down one if there is something I think I’ll like. After the first of the year I heard about the Paris exclusive called Noir Aphrodisiaque.

One of the reasons I was so interested in Noir Aphrodisiaque was because it felt like it was going to be the finish of what I call perfumer Calice Becker’s hot beverage trilogy. She assayed a study of green tea with 2014’s Imperial Tea. Later that year she would follow that up with Intoxicated which was inspired by Turkish coffee. When I read Noir Aphrodisiaque was chocolate and cinnamon I realized this was hot chocolate. It turns out that Noir Aphrodisiaque is that steaming cup of flavored milk I was hoping it would be.

Calice Becker

I make my hot chocolate with Dutch Process Cocoa powder; no Swiss Miss nonsense for me. I can’t speak for Mme Becker but it seems she also uses something similar in her home. It is because she starts with the dry dusty powdery cocoa and then by adding a creamy accord she forms the steaming beverage with cinnamon sprinkled on top.

Noir Aphrodisiaque opens on that chocolate dust through which passes a bit of bergamot, cedrat, and jasmine. These three notes are all used in moderation more to act as contrast to the drier version of cocoa in the early going. Then Mme Becker adds a creamy gourmand accord as the warm milk covers the cocoa and now turns it luscious. It is exactly the smell of the kind of rich hot chocolate I make. Then like a garnish she adds a sprinkle of cinnamon which melds into the gourmand accord. The final ingredient after a long while is amber which revives the cinnamon a bit over the final moments.

Noir Aphrodisiaque has 10-12 hour longevity and average sillage.

I am a big fan of Intoxicated it is one of my favorite By Kilian fragrance within the entire collection. Noir Aphrodisiaque is every bit as good as that one. I am now hoping Mme Becker has another hot beverage she wants to transform in to perfume. For these final days of winter, I’m going to spray myself with Noir Aphrodisiaque and warm my hands on a mug of hot chocolate.

Disclosure: This review is based on a sample I purchased.

–Mark Behnke

By Kilian 101- Five to Get You Started

Posted on by in Mark Behnke, Perfume 101 and tagged , , , , , , , , .

There was a real inflection point for niche perfume in the years 2005-2008. There were several fully realized brands which sprang up during that time. The successful formula consisted of a consistent vision, beautiful packaging; in some cases, luxury pricing and if you could get it a personable spokesperson. One of the brands which checked off all of these boxes was By Kilian. Fronted by the scion of a famous cognac family, Kilian Hennessy, By Kilian led with a luxurious vibe. M. Hennessy also had a vision of deeper fragrant experiences which has played out throughout most of the collection. One reason for that coherence is he has worked with a small roster of perfumers and one, Calice Becker, has been a de facto in-house perfumer for the brand. Many of her best perfumes reside within the By Kilian collection. She has done such excellent work that all five of the perfumes I am recommending as starting points below are composed by Mme Becker.

Kilian Hennessy

From the initial collection of six perfumes the one which exemplifies the brand best is Love: Don’t Be Shy. One of the hallmarks of the brand is unique gourmand fragrances. Love set that in motion right from the start. Mme Becker recreated an accord of rose water infused marshmallow. Redolent of orange blossom in the heart before tailing off into a sensual caramel and musk finish.

Another hallmark is the use of oud resulting in a series of multiple oud fragrances. The second one released, Rose Oud, is the easiest to start with. Mme Becker takes the classic rose and oud pairing breathing new life into it by using an oud accord of cedar, cypriol, and saffron. By using an accord, it allows for a more approachable oud experience. Spicing it up with cardamom and cinnamon before allowing a Bulgarian rose to capture the oud accord makes this one of the most easygoing oud perfumes out there.

Calice Becker

The perfume which I think is the modern masterpiece within the collection is Back to Black. As with the oud in Rose Oud in Back to Black Mme Becker constructs an exquisite tobacco accord. In the early going you can detect the individual blocks as things like chamomile, cardamom, and coriander begin to be enveloped by other notes until like a magic trick a rich honeyed tobacco appears and stays for hours. Then over the last few hours it deconstructs on the skin leaving an amber and vanilla base as the final memory.

A return to the gourmand comes in Intoxicated. The off-beat gourmand is on display as Mme Becker takes a Tuurkish coffee accord of cinnamon, nutmeg, and spun sugar over coffee and adds in a sticky green cardamom. It makes this an exotic coffee perfume.

There is also a collection which was meant to appeal to Eastern tastes. It was more austere and simply constructed than the rest of the line. Most of the time it concentrates on a single raw material. Sacred Wood is the best of these as Mme Becker again uses a Mysore sandalwood which she surrounds with carrot, cumin, elemi, and a hot milk accord. That latter piece truly makes the sandalwood creamy in every sense of the word.

By Kilian is a brand which has broken out of the niche pack by staying true to its vision, The five fragrances above are a good introduction to that.

Disclosure: This review is based on bottles I purchased.

–Mark Behnke